Daniels has watched such changes for some time. In the Potawatomi woods, he points to a dying fir tree. "Years back, I never seen anything dead like this," Daniels says. "The trees are lighter in color now. Even our fir trees are not as green as they used to be .

Daniels is not alone. In far northern Wisconsin on the Red Cliff Chippewa reservation, Marvin DeFoe has seen similar changes. Because he builds traditional birch bark canoes, he is particularly worried about the birch trees. He frequently visits the Potawatomi reservation to teach classes in birch bark canoe building and was there during the summer months. He noticed birch trees dying in the woods, just as they are on his own reservation. <

"I spend a lot of time in the woods," DeFoe said. "And I see a lot of different things. Not too long ago I went into the woods to get bark and I went to a tree but the bark wouldn't peel. I looked up in the tree and all the leaves were gone. It affected me so much I fell to the ground. <

"We believe these trees are alive and we ask for a piece of their skin," DeFoe continued. "But the birch trees are dying all around Lake Superior. The canoe trees are in danger of becoming extinct." <

These are not, it turns out, far-fetched worries. Science is beginning to confirm what Daniels and DeFoe have been seeing on their treks through the forest. <

Since 1992, Ed Jepsen, a plant pest and disease specialist with the Department of Natural Resources has been studying the impact of ozone on milkweed, one of the plants collected most frequently on the reservation for food and medicine. Jepsen has studied many plants to see if they might be used as bio-indicators, plants that would alert scientists to the impacts of air pollution, especially ozone. <

Jepsen found that milkweed is very sensitive to ozone. <

"In fact, it probably is, as a genus, more sensitive than all the other bio-indicator plants that we have," Jepsen said. <

Also, research by UW-Madison forest ecologists in northern Wisconsin shows that rising ozone levels dramatically decrease the growth of aspen and birch trees. And Richard Lindroth, a UW-Madison insect ecologist involved in the study, said it is likely that plants are also affected. <

"We've certainly known," Lindroth said, "that atmospheric pollution can and does affect the health of plants and even their chemical composition, reducing protein levels and increasing sugars." <

It probably isn't coincidence, then, that Daniels and DeFoe have seen changes in the woods. <

Nor does it seem unusual that the Potawatomi would try to use all the legal tools at their disposal to protect a resource that is so important to tribal members. In fact, the Potawatomi history is replete with such fights, all of which help put the current environmental struggle in perspective. <

There was a time, tribal member Jim Thunder says, that the Potawatomi had no home at all. <

Thunder knows the stories of the Potawatomi as well as anyone. He is an elder and a former tribal chairman, and he has heard the tales from those who have lived part of that history, his grandparents and others whose memories reach back over the years to a time when the Potawatomi had no home, no land to care for. <

Thunder told the stories while traveling across the reservation. Outside the landscape rolled by as Thunder spoke, forested hills and small clearings with modest homes or trailers. It seemed not that much different from other northern Wisconsin landscapes. But, as Thunder spoke, the land came alive with his stories. It was as if Thunder, with his deep and musical voice, was peopling the woods and villages of the reservation with the ghosts of a tragic but remarkable past. <

There was a time, Thunder said, when the Potawatomi were one of the most powerful tribes in the Upper Midwest, controlling millions of acres in Ohio, Indiana, Illinois and Wisconsin. But over the years, treaties with the United States government took away almost all of that land. In fact, Thunder said, the Potawatomi signed more treaties with the government - 42 in all - than any other tribe in the country. <

The first of the treaties was signed in 1795 in Ohio. The largest loss came in 1833 when the Treaty of Chicago took more than 5,000,000 acres. White expansion was so rapid, one Potawatomi chief complained, that "the plowshare is driven through our tents before we have time to carry out our goods and seek another habitation." <

Throughout the 1830s, Thunder said, the Potawatomi were also forced by the government from their ancestral lands. President Andrew Jackson had signed the Indian Removal Act in 1830 calling for all Indians living east of the Mississippi to be moved to land set aside for them west of the river. <

At least one band of Potawatomi was rounded up by soldiers and led on foot out of Wisconsin west into Oklahoma and Kansas. It was a nightmarish journey. Five or six members of the band died each day from lack of food and water. The Potawatomi still refer to the trip as the "Trail of Death." <

But many members of the band refused to go, Thunder said, choosing instead to take refuge deep in the forests of their homeland in north-central Wisconsin. <

"Some escaped," Thunder said. "One of those who escaped was my grandfather. Many people fled into the bush." <

So it was, Thunder said, that the forest provided a haven and shelter for the Potawatomi. The forest was big enough in those days, he said, that people could disappear. They built homes from bark and hunted deer and collected plants for foods and medicine. And, Thunder said, they moved deeper and deeper into the woods, hiding and hoping the soldiers would not come after them. <

These Potawatomi who stayed behind, Thunder said, became known as people without a home. They were called the "Strolling Potawatomi." After having once presided over as many as 300 million acres in the Great Lakes region, the Potawatomi who had stayed behind were landless because they had refused the government's order to leave. <

But, unlike the tribal members who were relocated or those other groups who ended up in places as far-flung as Mexico (some of them actually joined the Mexican Army in its siege of the Alamo), the Potawatomi who hid in the forests also stayed close to their cultural roots. <

In 1909, this homeless group of Potawatomi - about 457 were living near Laona in Forest County - was visited by a U.S. Senate committee convened to hear the band's grievances about the loss of their land and the lack of a reservation. The senators were surprised to find a resilient people who had not lost their political structure or tribal identity or even their language. Few of the Potawatomi spoke English and their chief, Kish-ki-kam, spoke for them, telling the senators the tribe wanted land in one piece. <

Finally, in 1913, the Strolling Potawatomi found a permanent home. With money promised them in the 1833 treaty, the Treaty of Chicago, the band purchased its 11,444-acre reservation between Crandon and Wabeno in Forest County. <

Thunder finishes his story, pauses and adds with a smile: <

"So, it took 200 years for us to get land that was promised in those first treaties. We lost a lot of attorneys; they died of old age. And we finally got paid for Chicago. Of course, by that time, we didn't want it anymore." <

Though sad, the inspiring history of the Potawatomi goes a long way toward explaining their passionate attachment to their land and to its health. Both because their ancestors struggled to get the acreage and because their culture and spirituality is rooted in the land, the Potawatomi are devoted conservationists. Many in the tribe, like Thunder, are tied closely by story and blood to those days when the forest meant shelter and safety. <

Paul Johnson is head of communications for the tribe and though he isn't a tribal member, he appreciates the Potawatomi emphasis on environment. <

"Environmentalism isn't a movement to the Potawatomi," Johnson said. "It's a way of life. It goes beyond politics. Really, what the Potawatomi are trying to do is to maintain a quality of life by taking a holistic approach." <

Just as the tribe's history has been full of turmoil, the recent efforts to establish tougher air standards has been met with criticism from several quarters, including the DNR and local governments that fear the tribe will gain too much influence over decisions regarding power plants and other polluters. <

It's still unclear what the full impact of the new designation will be. But, because of the change, the state will have to put tougher regulations into place for smokestack industries, such as paper mills and utilities, within 62 miles of the reservation. The most stringent requirements would apply to projects within 10 miles of the reservation's boundaries. <

Communities within the area affected by the designation include Rhinelander, Crandon, Tomahawk, Merrill and Antigo. <

While other tribes in Wisconsin have not sought tougher air quality standards for their reservations, several have petitioned the EPA to set more stringent water quality standards. The Mole Lake Chippewa band fought and won a court battle to set higher water standards. <

Now, according to Hubacher, the Potawatomi air quality specialist, the band is conducting scientific monitoring at several places on the reservation. She said the monitoring will provide baseline data to cite when pollution permits are sought within the area regulated by the tribe. <

"When a major source requests a permit," Hubacher said, "that's when the tribe will be able to use its authority." <

To tribal leaders such as Jim Thunder, winning the fight to set environmental standards is no small victory for the Potawatomi and is testament to the perseverance of a people who less than one hundred years ago had no land on which to build their homes. <